


Chrislo and Sebstitch

by ninemoons42



Category: Actor RPF, Lilo & Stitch (2002), Marvel Cinematic Universe RPF
Genre: Alien Character(s), Canon-Typical Violence, Car Chases, Chris Evans is the sweet bumbling hero, Crack Crossover, Crash into Hello, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Cute, Dreams and Nightmares, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Crack, Free Fall, Happily Ever After, Hawaii, Inspired By Tumblr, Knives, M/M, Meet-Cute, Protectiveness, Ridiculously Human Aliens, Sebastian Stan is also cute and fluffy, Spaceships, Surfing, Things Blowing Up, author tries to be funny
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-28
Updated: 2014-09-29
Packaged: 2018-02-06 13:57:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 19
Words: 15,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1860537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ninemoons42/pseuds/ninemoons42
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chris Evans: Boston kid transplanted to Hawaii in search of himself and maybe a little happiness.</p><p>Sebastian-Stitch: indestructible weapon of mass destruction who sinks like a brick in water.</p><p>They crash-land into each other and hilarity - and maybe something good - ensues.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [luninosity](https://archiveofourown.org/users/luninosity/gifts).



> That title pretty much IS this AU: Evanstan done as Disney's _Lilo and Stitch_. I may or may not be following the actual plot of the movies or of the TV show - this was originally planned to be just a bunch of random vignettes of hijinks and cute.
> 
> Uh, musical inspiration from [HERE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4aor3FulOU) and [HERE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtsV4bWPHsY).
> 
> Luninosity told me to do it, and I love her to pineapple-scented bits and pieces, so here it is.

The sun beats down upon his shoulders and back, on the wind-cooled skin of his face, and the warmth is still like nothing he's ever experienced before or since. Salt on his lips, fine grit in the palms of his hands.

Here, sitting on a surfboard and waiting for the right moment to go for the waves, Chris Evans takes a deep breath and feels it fill up his lungs completely, and the clamoring voices in his head go quiet.

A brief eternity of pure calm.

The wind whistles past him and he can hear the rolling roar of the waves. He grins, turns the surfboard clumsily, paddles toward the wavefront - there, there, just in time, and the wave that rises up before him, around him, is full of elemental power and the rush of the sea, and he hurries to catch it, maneuvers himself upright on his board, arms outstretched for balance -

Chris crouches and screams with joy, riding the wave as best as he can, until the inevitable moment when he tips over too far and overturns, the board flying out from under his feet - and the water he lands in is cool and clear and kind, catching him in its blue grip and buoying him towards the shore.

Sand flows and settles beneath his feet as he picks up his errant surfboard - nothing fancy about it, just plain red decorated in broad white leaves - and walks, waterlogged and wobbly, towards the rock where he'd stashed his things. A battered duffel bag. A bottle of suntan lotion rattles around in it, only half-cushioned by a pair of flip-flops and a dry t-shirt.

Chris ducks into one of the communal showers and rinses the waves from his skin. The mirror shows him a face full of five o'clock shadow and his hair turning bleached blonde at the tips. He takes a picture of himself in the mirror and sends it on to his mother, with a smiley face at the end ( _Wish you were here! :D Love to everyone - C_ ) - and that's when he glances at a clock hanging on the wall. Large numbers, easy to read -

"Oh, _shit_ ," he says, and he only has enough time to wring out his board shorts and jump back into them, still clumsy-drunk and wobbling in his footwear from the constant movement of the sea. The t-shirt pinches slightly against his shoulders - he needs to buy the next larger size, again - and there's nothing to do for his dripping hair as he dashes out the door and down several blocks.

Anthony is already serving a trio of tourists when Chris barrels in through the front door, saying, "Sorry, sorry, I'm late!"

"Dammit, Evans," Anthony Mackie says, but he looks more affectionate than exasperated, and Chris throws him a strained smile and hurries into the stock room, so he can put his things away -

Only to run into the manager. Chris always saw the stern face before he saw the loud print of the shirt, and as always, he can't help but back away and cringe, and he hates himself a little for that last bit. "Sorry, sir," Chris says. "Won't happen again - "

"And how many times have I heard that before?" The stern face slips and turns into a full-on frown. "Look, I get it, you're still enjoying the new climate and the fact that the sea likes us so much around here. But I do have to run a business. The next time you're late, I _will_ have to do something about it. Are we clear?"

Chris hangs his head. "Yes, sir."

He can't bounce around and be enthusiastic as he joins Anthony at the till, where more tourists are now clamoring for sunglasses and neon-colored swimsuits and all sorts of souvenirs like seashell purses and anthropomorphic pineapple figurines, the morning's wave-borne bliss turned into a leaden weight in his limbs.

At the end of the day, Anthony eyes him up and says, "You're not okay."

"So what else is new," Chris says.

"How about a couple of beers?"

"No, thanks, I kind of want to think."

And he turns his back on the knowing look in Anthony's eyes. He stares at his feet on the sidewalk, one step after the other, heading for the small box of an apartment that he calls home, and most things about this view are too familiar to him.

At the corner, Chris rakes his hair out of his eyes and looks up at the stars instead. Finds himself making a wish.

"I just need to catch a break, really - I just want things to be okay - " He has no idea who might be hearing him. He knows the world likes to pass him by and sometimes mock him. He knows he's not good with people and he's never all right just by himself - 

The sky lights up. Lurid green streak, west to east.

Chris stares, blinded by afterimages, and then - without knowing why - he starts running toward where that line of light might have landed.


	2. Chapter 2

Stars flash and flicker past, far too quickly, and the echoes of angry shouting are still filling his ears. Pointy ears, thank you, because he's been made well and made indestructible and made to do one thing and one thing only.

He hangs on to the arms of the pilot's chair. The coverall he'd been wearing in the stasis-chamber itches around his neck. Eyes moving rapidly over the displays. He'd stolen this ship in a blaze of a firefight - his own plasma bursts versus a truly ineffectual collection of laser-bolt weaponry - without knowing that it was going somewhere, much less where it was headed.

He's not familiar with the coordinates on the rightmost display: some kind of galactic backwater? But it might be a start. He wants to find a city; he'll rampage through it and steal what resources he'll need, move on, do it again. It's a funny thought. He starts with a grin and then he starts laughing, anticipating -

A planet. His destination?

His stasis chamber had been labeled Prisoner 626. But he knows who he is, knows a name and a function. Sebastian-Stitch, weapon of mass destruction. He can't wait to get started. 

A planet that's blue blue blue.

For a moment, he's afraid.

One weakness, and one weakness only.

He is no good in water: he's too dense and he has no programming or desire or inclination to swim. 

Sebastian-Stitch's eyes widen as the planet speeds closer and closer, and - water. Water everywhere. Specks of land in the distance, growing only fractionally larger as he continues to approach.

 _No no no no,_ he thinks, and there's nothing he can do to veer off course - the navigational controls are locked and not even to any species that had been hybridized into his genetic material - 

The words tail off into the vilest curses he knows as trees and ground and rocks come hurtling up towards him, as if to grab him and throw him and - 

Explosions, impact, and he feels himself flying through the air, and all he can do is roll himself up into a ball, because he's indestructible but that doesn't mean he can't feel pain, and landing _will_ hurt -

A sound. Like a voice. Sebastian-Stitch listens, and almost understands - 

"I'm here! I'll catch you?"

And impact. Again. But this time he's hit something that is indisputably alive. Sebastian-Stitch has landed with his ear against something firm, and beneath that is the sound of something familiar: a living heartbeat.

Sebastian-Stitch uncurls, and is stopped from doing so completely by something wrapped around him - restraints? He struggles briefly, rolls free, rolls into a crouch.

Bipedal, upright-walking, full head of hair, unusual shoulder-to-waist ratio - and blue eyes.

"Hi," says the being who'd caught him from the sky. "I'm Chris. Are you all right?"

His instincts are screaming at him to attack.

Sebastian-Stitch blinks, and raises his hand as he's seen other beings do, and he says, mouth shaping the syllable with a little difficulty, "Hi."


	3. Chapter 3

"You did what now?"

Anthony looks and sounds - well. Chris momentarily finds himself lacking adjectives. Or at least it's very hard to parse the expressions flickering across his friend's face.

He'd managed to pry a name of some kind from the - very weirdly attractive - young man he'd found and carried home, though not without considerable difficulty. He'd weighed almost as much as Chris himself does now. Well-muscled arms and a beautifully proportioned back, though that last bit was also marred in places by the remnants of whatever had exploded around him.

Oh, and has he mentioned the part where "weirdly attractive" works out to pointy ears like those of a Middle-Earth elf, and blue eyes with vertically slitted pupils, and black hair stranded with actual electric blue that doesn't seem dyed at all?

Chris looks at the curtain that separates his bedroom from the rest of his dinky little apartment, and looks at Anthony's exasperated face on the screen of his phone, and mentally throws up his hands. Yeah. He has officially gotten to the part where he no longer has any adjectives for _anything_ : life, the universe, the maybe-person he's brought home, and everything else.

"I found this kid on my way home and he doesn't look like he's all quite human and now the kid is sleeping in my bed and I'm going to spend the night on my couch and - " And Chris shrugs, helplessly. "Maybe it'll all sort itself out in the morning."

"And maybe I'll come by and put the fear of God Himself into you," Anthony says, though there doesn't seem to be any actual anger in those words, or so Chris thinks. "I get you're not always okay and I keep telling you, I completely understand, I'm not running away, that is not what a friend does and no matter how hard it gets or weird things are I am your friend, Chris Evans, you know that, right?"

"Yes, Anthony."

"But. And you knew there was a big BUT coming. I have no honest idea what's going through your head right now, and you're also telling me you've picked up some kind of - stray?" 

"Yes."

Anthony sucks a breath in through his teeth. "At least tell me he's cute. This stray of yours. Has he got a name?"

He's not cute, is the first thing Chris wants to say.

Because if you got past the decidedly-not-human bits, Chris's "stray" - who is apparently named or called Sebastian-Stitch, he has no idea what that means, is _gorgeous_. 

Chris looks at the curtain again, and back to Anthony. "If you're gonna follow through on that threat of yours you can see him when you come by. Call him Sebastian-Stitch. He seems to answer to that just fine." 

Grumbling. Maybe Anthony now sounds fond. "I'll do just that."

The words come out of Chris's mouth before he has time to filter them. "Hey, Anthony. Um, thanks. For. You know, da kine."

Anthony laughs uproariously. "Boston boy saying _da kine_. This is why we're friends, brah."

Chris hangs up on him.

The couch is narrow and short and lumpy, but he's more than used to it - and he likes the faint sea-smell of it. Sometimes it's the only place in his little apartment where he can be calm. So he knows how to fold himself into place, and the couch rescues him from waking into sleep.

*

Footsteps nearby: quiet. Too quiet.

Chris bolts up from the cushions.

Looks around.

Chris blinks, rubs the sleep from his eyes as roughly as he can, blinks again, and still doesn't understand what he's looking at.

Last night's stray - Sebastian-Stitch - is carefully sorting through what looks like the entire contents of the refrigerator. Cans and containers and stray bananas, and how has he opened the can of pineapple chunks when Chris knows for a fact that his can opener has been missing for a week?

Slowly, hands up and out in the air, he gets up, and walks over to his guest. "Um. Good morning?"

A sunny smile. 

It rocks Chris back on his heels, unexpectedly.

"A-lo-ha," is the first response he gets, followed by: "Food? This is food?"

"It is, mostly," Chris tells him. Then he catches sight of a half-gutted orange and shakes his head. "Maybe you'd better not eat that, though."

"Okay." Sebastian-Stitch picks another piece of pineapple out of the open can and regards it with narrowed eyes, then pops it into his mouth. "This is good."

"I'm glad you can talk," Chris says, and the words sound inane to his own ears. "Nice to hear another human voice in here." He busies himself with his own breakfast: a glass of iced coffee, some bread, peanut butter, the last of the strawberry jam. He's hungry, and still not entirely awake, and as a consequence is so intent on his sandwich-in-the-making that he almost doesn't hear the response:

"Not human."

"Come again?"

"Not. Human," Sebastian-Stitch says, pointing to himself. To his nose.

And that's when Chris twigs to the claws. Shapely, sharp, needle-like. The claw on the middle finger still has a piece of pineapple speared onto it.

He glances at Sebastian-Stitch's face. The feral cast to his mouth, the tense cords in his neck, the narrowed eyes that look hunted and angry at the same time. His black-and blue hair, almost standing on end. The sharp points of some of his teeth.

A stark contrast to last night, amid the wreckage and the flames, when he'd stared, and sort-of smiled, and said, "Hi."

So Chris finishes making his sandwich and cuts it into two triangles, and all he says is, "So that's how you opened the can."

Sebastian-Stitch blinks - interesting, he seems to have some kind of translucent third eyelid. Eats his pineapple.

Chris smiles at him in turn. Doesn't stop smiling as he offers half of his sandwich.

And Sebastian-Stitch takes the offered food.


	4. Chapter 4

The place where Chris lives is small, and there are all kinds of corners for him to hide in. He still needs more data as to whether it's easily defensible, or whether there's something in its corners and cupboards that he can use to defend himself with. To attack with.

He's in a place where the day is long and hot and he watches, with narrowed eyes, as Chris does things that seem calculated to fight off that relentless, constant heat. He drinks water, and almost always offers Sebastian-Stitch the first sip. He sits next to something with spinning blades - a weapon, but also something that sends out blasts of cold air - and invites Sebastian-Stitch to sit in the vicinity of that machine. 

At some point during the hottest part of the day he takes his shirt off completely.

Sebastian-Stitch only narrows his eyes at him when he does that, and doesn't follow suit.

He soon observes another effect of the heat on Chris's species: it apparently makes Chris sleepy. Chris is sitting on the floor near the counter, and one moment he's fiddling with some sort of technological device with both hands, and the next he's closed his eyes and bowed his head, and he doesn't move for long enough that Sebastian-Stitch goes to click his fingers near his ears.

Chris doesn't react.

Some kind of spiky, nervous feeling grows in Sebastian-Stitch's chest and makes him take the only chair, quietly, and sit down carefully in it, and watch over the unconscious Chris.

What kind of being was this Chris? Did he not know what Sebastian-Stitch was? Because Sebastian-Stitch knows. He can tell him. He can show him. He can generate spheres of white-hot plasma, and that's just his most obvious weapon, his most visible means of fighting. He can punch through many kinds of walls and he can break out of most kinds of prison. The walls in this place are laughably thin and all he needs to do is push one out, make a neat hole for himself to fit through, and he'd be gone from here. He can fight dirty and fight well, armed or not. And he's come to this place so he can find new things to destroy and new places to leave in flames.

But Chris. Why did Chris catch him, and why did Chris bring him back to the place that is apparently his home, and why hasn't Chris rejected him, when he'd said he wasn't human, when he'd showed him his claws?

Sebastian-Stitch cocks his head to the side, observing the still-unconscious Chris - and then. There's a sound from outside. Footsteps, approaching.

Sebastian-Stitch goes on full alert: he bares his teeth, and springs up onto the chair. A defensive crouch. If whatever is outside tries to smash its way in - he'll fight.

Four blows on the door, a pause, and two more blows.

"Wha - " And Chris jerks clumsily to his feet before he opens his eyes.

Sebastian-Stitch growls, and points to the source of the sound. It's coming from outside. "Danger," he warns.

"No, no, if they're knocking that doesn't usually mean anything life-threatening," Chris slurs out. He stumbles to the door. Before he opens it, however, he seems to look at Sebastian-Stitch, and he says, "Easy. We're not going to get attacked."

Sebastian-Stitch doesn't believe him.

Not even when the door opens and the man on the threshold grins and says in a loud voice, "Dude!"

"Hey, Anthony," Chris says, and Sebastian-Stitch watches him move aside to let the man in. 

"Brought you some decent iced coffee, because man, the stuff you drink - that shit ain't fit for human consumption," Anthony says. He says his words differently from Chris - some sounds are faster and some sounds are slower.

"You drink it anyway."

Sebastian-Stitch narrows his eyes as Anthony comes closer, as he holds out a hand. "You must be his crash-landed visitor. Aloha, I'm Anthony."

Sebastian-Stitch takes the proffered hand and examines it. No weapons, no claws, nothing but the ever-present smell of salt water, which makes Sebastian-Stitch frown and drop the hand.

Water. He can't forget it. Can't do anything about it. He's in a place surrounded by water. And the ship he'd commandeered is nothing more than a complete wreck.

"I don't think he likes me," Anthony says.

As soon as his back is turned, Sebastian-Stitch hisses very quietly in his direction.

"Don't do that, Chris's stray, I do bad things to people who talk about me behind my back."

"No fighting in here, gents, I don't think I could afford the repairs," Chris says, and Sebastian-Stitch's ears catch the quiet fear in his voice, although Chris seems to be smiling.

What does that mean?

There's no time to contemplate. Chris is putting a shirt on, something with loud colors to clash with what Anthony is already wearing. "Come on," he says as he passes Sebastian-Stitch.

So he jumps off the chair and follows them out. There's a pause as Chris secures the door, and Sebastian-Stitch memorizes the exact arrangement of plants and trees and stone so he can get back if he needs to.

"Can you drink coffee?" Chris asks after a moment, offering him a small cup.

"I don't know coffee," Sebastian-Stitch tells him.

"Try it, you might like it."

Sebastian-Stitch carefully curves his fingers and claws around the cup. The liquid within is dark and bitterly fragrant. Lumps of ice floating on the surface. 

He only means to take a sip - instead, he drains the cup dry, ice and all.

Energy! A rush of power!

He takes off running, and can't stop himself: he tumbles down the trail, catching himself expertly on his hands and taking off into another series of stunts. Gravity falls away from him, and he savors the sensation of his blood rushing through his veins. He doesn't have to think about placing his hands and feet correctly - he just does, and he doesn't tire as he leaps and rolls and flows through the air.

He catches a glimpse of the others' faces: Anthony looks shocked and impressed, and Chris looks both worried and enthusiastic.

He smiles, and rolls so that he's standing on one hand, perfectly balanced.

He glances at his free hand, and concentrates briefly. His reward: a flash of coruscating light, little more than a spark. Flex of muscles, and he's upright and completely airborne, and he throws that spark at Chris's feet.

Sebastian-Stitch closes his eyes and smiles when Chris gasps - and he starts laughing when Anthony shrieks, " _What the hell is he doing, trying to blow us up?!_ "


	5. Chapter 5

"...and here's the bathroom," Chris tells his guest, who has been following him around on stealthy feet for the past few minutes.

After spending the afternoon with Anthony and introducing Sebastian-Stitch to the the idea of the plate lunch, he's wound up back here, in his own little sort-of home.

Normally, on a night like this, he'd be forced to listen to nothing but his own thoughts. To the capricious breezes and to the distant call-and-response of waves crashing onto sand and rock. Nervous energy, and the lack of room to pace, and the same old fears and doubts that he carries around with him, like the proverbial albatross lashed to his back.

(Some days, he really wishes he'd never read _The Rime of the Ancient Mariner_ , because regret has tasted like fouled seawater and the last drowned breath before the depths ever since.)

Tonight, however, he's been playing the host, and he's been busy absorbing every bit of knowledge he can get about his unexpected, non-human, good-looking guest. 

For starters, Sebastian-Stitch seems to be capable of eating most everything that's offered to him - as Anthony found out when he passed him a malasada wrapped in tissue and Sebastian-Stitch ate the whole thing in one bite, licking up the scraps of paper from the corners of his mouth. 

Sebastian-Stitch doesn't turn up his nose at drinks either, though Chris made a point out of quietly steering him away from both caffeine and alcohol.

(He still wishes he'd managed to take a photograph - or a video - of Anthony's expression when Sebastian-Stitch had tossed the first fireball. Maybe there'll be other opportunities. He's got a few scores to settle with Anthony, and he's not above using the help when it's been tossed right into his lap. 

(Metaphorically speaking.)

Now, Sebastian-Stitch folds his arms across his chest. Tilts his head and squints, and Chris has never seen anyone look suspicious and adorable at the same time. 

"Bathroom. Sonic waves?" Sebastian-Stitch asks.

Chris frowns. "Sorry, I don't follow. Here we use water if we want to wash and keep ourselves clean."

Sebastian-Stitch shudders, extravagantly. "I don't like water. Drowning."

"Not really the point of this," Chris says, and how is he having a conversation like this, like normal interaction, with someone who is very clearly not from this world? Still, he manages to keep his voice neutral and sort of friendly. "The water falls on you, and you sort of splash it along your skin, and it washes the dirt away. Then the water goes away through that drain," and he points to it.

"Inefficient."

"It's what we've got. Feel free to use it and the toilet whenever you need to."

After a long time, Sebastian-Stitch steps forward from the doorway into the bathroom, and now that they're both inside the same room there doesn't seem to be a lot of space to share. 

Chris glances at him in the mirror. There's dirt in the blue-stranded dark hair, and tiny scratches still healing around one pointed ear. "I hope you don't mind that we don't have any hot water."

Sebastian-Stitch shrugs, minutely.

"I'll be outside if you need me," Chris says.

His shoulder brushes Sebastian-Stitch's on the way out.

He yawns, and drops heavily onto the foot of his bed. The frame creaks unhappily beneath him. 

He's torn between nervousness and an odd elation that clicks and thrums beneath his skin. On the one hand, he has company, someone to talk to, someone he might actually have some conversations with, because it's clear that Sebastian-Stitch comes from someplace more advanced. Sonic waves for showering? Talk about a way of conserving scarce natural resources. Chris has a friend who campaigns for water rights.

On the other hand, he has company.

And Chris doesn't always believe in himself when it comes to interaction - human or, in this case, alien. That was part of the reason he came here to Hawaii in the first place. The wind and the waves are still more constant companions to him, despite his clumsiness at swimming and surfing.

He doesn't even always hang out with Anthony. He's just lucky Anthony understands, or thinks he understands.

Chris puts his head in his hands.

And then - the most unexpected thing. A steady stream of water, and a series of soft falling sounds.

Chris makes himself get up and rummage around for clean clothes and an extra towel, and leaves that bundle on the shelf nearest the door into the bathroom.

He yawns, and returns to his bed, and there's only time to take a deep breath and kick off his flip-flops before - suddenly, silently, soothingly, sleep.

His last conscious thought: thanks might be in order, because Sebastian-Stitch's presence means he might be able to get away from the nightmares. It'd be worth it, for just one uninterrupted night.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (I make no secret of the fact that I have been looking forward to this bit since I thought I'd make a go of this crazy, sweet, but very tropically-laid back AU.)

It's not the first time Sebastian-Stitch has found himself staying up until all hours of the night. Earth's stellar day is much shorter than what he's used to - the days and the nights seem to flash by too quickly, leaving him restless, leaving him at a loss. He doesn't need as much rest as human beings seem to do, and unlike Chris, he doesn't work, which means that he has even fewer means of depleting his resources. Energy, time, and the inexplicable urge to move around.

Sebastian-Stitch has already followed that reckless and all-too-fallible instinct to the shore. Once. He's not going to repeat the experience. Scratch that, he's going to do everything in his not-inconsiderable power to avoid getting into the water again. Dry land is safe. He will not sink on dry land.

Instead he spends his time observing. He follows Chris around when Chris is at home, and when Chris is not at home, Sebastian-Stitch goes through what little the house has to offer. There are several old, beaten-up books piled atop a chest with gaudy colored fittings, and that's not the only place Sebastian-Stitch has found those books. They seem to be everywhere in the little apartment, and they seem to be on a lot of science-related topics.

He'd almost had his hopes raised for Chris to be a scientist, a much kinder one, at least compared to the one who'd created Sebastian-Stitch, grown him in a vat and then let him loose when he'd become too restive to be strapped down for intrusive testing. Testing for what - he hadn't known and he hadn't wanted to know. It wasn't what he'd been built for. That was something he knew in his core and that was the impulse behind leveling those cities, taunting the authorities, withstanding siege and blast and one futile attack after another.

In the bed behind him, Chris sleeps, opens his eyes partway, and doesn't wake.

Sebastian-Stitch watches him toss restlessly on the sheets.

Eventually Chris settles, closes his eyes once again. He groans softly to himself, as though he were in pain, but to Sebastian-Stitch's sharp eyes there is nothing physically amiss about him.

Sebastian-Stitch puts the book in his hand away - _A Brief History of Time_ \- and goes out of Chris's room to get the chair.

He pads back on stealthy feet. He apparently has permission to do anything and everything he wants as long as he stays within the apartment and doesn't destroy it or anything in it, and while he occasionally glares at things within those confines - such as the bed that seems to be one of the reasons why the man currently occupying it can't actually sleep - he has done his best to abide by those entirely arbitrary rules.

Arbitrary, but keeping to them means a place to stay, where no one jeers at him or attacks him in the name of science.

Sebastian-Stan perches on the chair after putting it at the foot of the bed, and watches Chris murmur to himself.

He has an odd urge to reach out to Chris and - do what? 

He keeps his hands and claws and feet to himself, and watches, and listens.

Some nights, Chris talks in his sleep. He seems to worry a lot, even when he is up and awake, going away in the mornings and coming home in the evenings, and he doesn't stop worrying just because he's sleeping. 

Sebastian-Stitch has heard of things called dreams and nightmares, and knows what the words mean, and has never had any such experiences, so he doesn't know what they actually do to someone who has them, to someone who seems to be caught in the tight grip of phantoms and fears.

Sebastian-Stitch doesn't know much about fear; he doesn't really need it, and isn't interested in fostering it, because he can get out of most situations that cause fear, except for the brief time of his imprisonment. That's the thing he's afraid of.

"No, don't, scared," Chris mutters. He shifts on the bed and the rattle of his body on the sheets is startlingly loud.

Sebastian-Stitch recoils. The words in his head, coming out from Chris's twisted mouth. 

Sebastian-Stitch doesn't like fear. And he doesn't like the idea of Chris suffering from fear. Paralyzed by it. Hurting.

He swallows, and says Chris's name, once, quietly.

Chris doesn't seem to hear him. He's too lost. His voice is getting more and more broken and shaken. Thinner. 

"Chris," Sebastian-Stitch says.

Still no response. 

Holding back his strength as best as he can, Sebastian-Stitch kicks the foot of the bed. His intention is to jar its occupant without causing any harm to either that person or to the none-too-sturdy frame itself.

(Why are the things in this apartment old and shabby and half in disrepair, Sebastian-Stitch thinks.)

A second kick. Still no response.

Sebastian-Stitch shouts. " _Chris!_ "

And Chris comes awake with an inarticulate cry.

Sebastian-Stitch blinks.

They're face-to-face, and how had Chris managed to squirm his way most of the length of the bed, so that the tip of his nose is just an inch away from Sebastian-Stitch's, and is he all right?

He asks none of those questions. He says, instead, as he had on the night they'd met, "Hi."

Chris stares at him, wild-eyed, and - finally - responds. "Hi."

"You're not okay," Sebastian-Stitch says, bluntly.

"Not okay. Yes. That's an understatement."

Sebastian-Stitch blinks again. "I cleaned the apartment while you were gone," he offers, and doesn't know why he says it.

"Thank you." Chris swallows, dashes the back of his hand over his eyes, over his face. He smiles, or attempts to. It doesn't look like a smile, not even to Sebastian-Stitch's limited experience. "I - I'm sorry. Nightmares, you know. Hard to escape them. I could never master lucid dreaming."

Sebastian-Stitch stares. 

"Thanks," Chris says again.

"Why?"

"You woke me up. You got me out of there. I - I really appreciate it."

"You're not okay." Sebastian-Stitch says it again.

"I'm not." Chris untangles himself from the sheets with difficulty. He's sweated through the ragged shirt he wore to sleep. "That's me."

"I'm not okay," Sebastian-Stitch offers. "I told you. I am an escaped prisoner."

"Yeah."

Somehow that makes Sebastian-Stitch feel content. "Yeah," he echoes.

Chris doesn't go back to sleep. Sebastian-Stitch watches him read.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Inspiration for the central image of this chapter from [HERE](http://img4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20130519005453/disney/images/d/d3/StitchSeaTurtleGK.jpg). ♥

A few days later, Anthony has to leave earlier than usual, claiming he's got another appointment, and Chris watches him square it with their dour-faced boss, and waves goodbye when Anthony strides quickly out the door.

Not five minutes later Chris's phone buzzes. He has to look around to see if there are any customers coming in. What he sees instead is the boss standing at the door, reaching for the sign, flipping it from OPEN to CLOSED. 

He's still careful anyway, ducking most of the way behind a shelf full of suntan lotion and aftersun products, before pulling his phone out of his pocket.

Anthony's sent him a text message, straight to the point. _Sorry to run out on you, brah._

_I told you, it's okay,_ Chris texts back, squinting in rapt concentration at his phone. _It's not every day you get friends visiting. Just have a good time, okay?_

_Okay._

Chris puts his phone away, catches a sour expression on the boss's face, and hurries through the rest of the after-shift chores. He counts the take in the register and sorts bills and bags it all up for the next morning's trip to the bank. He mops the sand and the dried-up patches of seawater from the floor. He double-checks the locks, and then triple-checks them, and all in all it's another hour and a half before he's told he's free to go.

His phone buzzes at him again. This time the notification tells him he's received a photograph. 

Chris blinks, and looks up into the sunset-stained dusk sky for answers. There aren't any.

And when he loads the image, he stops stock-still on the sidewalk for a few moments.

That Sebastian-Stitch is on the beach, that's not surprising.

That Sebastian-Stitch is staying well away from the waves washing softly up onto the seashells and sand and left-behind towels, that's expected.

Chris blinks, and looks around wildly. Steps into a narrow alley between an ice cream shop and one of Chris's favorite coffee places. He turns the phone sideways to get a bigger view of the photo.

According to the bright blue sky streaked with a handful of wispy clouds, the photo seems to have been taken earlier in the day. There's a hashtag in the caption: _#unexpectedlyheartwarming_. No shadows on the sand, which seems to blaze with bright powerful heat.

Except for the center of the photograph. The shirt is familiar; it's bright red and yellow tinged with green. Chris had found it in the back of his closet over the course of the previous weekend. On Sebastian-Stitch it seems to strain just a little around the shoulders.

In the photo, Sebastian-Stitch is marching over the sand. He's holding a large leaf with lobes, and he casts a long shadow ahead of him, which seems to be just what the turtles walking in front of him need.

Chris blinks, and takes the photo in, slowly comprehending.

Sebastian-Stitch has spent his day, or part of it, sheltering a turtle that seems to be on its way to the sea. A turtle that is carrying one of its young on its shell. Flippers and feet in motion, and a long spar of shade.

Chris blinks again, and puts his phone away. His heart is strangely lighter, uplifted, from where he'd spent the day in weary repetition at work.

When he gets to the part of the shore that heads toward his apartment, the sky has begun to sprout stars. Distant points of light. He glances up at them, then back down to the earth - where he finds a shadowed shape that is still looking up.

He shuffles over the sand, and makes what noise he can, including clearing his throat.

Prior experience has taught him that Sebastian-Stitch does not like being sneaked up on. There is a scorch mark on the floor next to his couch to prove it.

"Chris," Sebastian-Stitch says. He doesn't turn around. He doesn't look over his shoulder. And Chris is comfortable with that.

"Hi there," Chris says. "Did you have a productive day?"

"I walked with turtles. They are wise creatures."

"They do look pretty cool. And they can live for, um, hundreds and hundreds of years." Chris drops unceremoniously into the sand, not touching, but within arm's reach.

The starlight falls into Sebastian-Stitch's hair, and seems to catch in those black and blue strands.

"Someone sent me a picture of what you were doing," Chris says, as twilight fades into the first stirrings of the starlit night, as the moon appears over the horizon. Bright golden cool glow. 

Sebastian-Stitch almost smiles. "I learned much from turtles today."

Chris nods, and thinks about Sebastian-Stitch communicating with turtles, and envies him, just a little.

"But now I am hungry. I have not eaten much."

That makes him jump up with alacrity. "Okay. Um. Dinner, then. Sandwiches?"

"Peanut butter?"

"And cheese." Now Chris does laugh when Sebastian-Stitch looks at him, with an extremely scandalized expression on his face. "Don't knock it till you've tried it. I grew up on that stuff."

As they leave, Chris catches sight of a leaf that looks quite similar to the one the Sebastian-Stitch in the photograph had used, stirring atop the water as the waves rushed softly and inexorably to shore.

Sebastian-Stitch ahead of him, picked out in the starlight.

Chris smiles, and thinks about home.

And then he glances at Sebastian-Stitch's back, and wonders about _his_ home, and he knows he'll have to ask.


	8. Chapter 8

He's nodding off.

The book in his hands is set on a planet covered in desert sands and blazing skies, and it is interesting, especially when it talks about gigantic sandworms, because he'd like to get into a fight with one of those: the sheer size, the sheer bulk, the speed and maneuverability. It would be an interesting contest. He'd like to challenge one, just one, just to see where the limits of his own strength are.

He's confident he won't get eaten.

Not right away.

But he's nodding off, and he shakes his head roughly. He scratches all over his scalp, viciously, just this side of drawing blood. He shivers and he shakes and he tries to stay awake.

He stays awake while Chris sleeps, because Chris needs to be guarded, because Chris needs to be protected. Sometimes Chris forgets to lock the door after himself when he comes back in from the day's work, from the sun and from the waves.

When he does that Sebastian-Stitch frowns and goes to lock the door and makes sure that it's locked, and he stays extra vigilant throughout the night.

He knows he doesn't need much rest. He can rest during the daytime, and when it's his turn to sleep he not only locks the door after Chris has left - he also shoves the chair he likes to sit in under the doorknob.

He can sleep and still be aware of his surroundings. His ears hear everything. The incessant song of the waves, the birds that wing through the blue skies, the whispers of the wind.

Now he's listening attentively to Chris's light snuffling snores.

He takes in Chris's contortions on the bed, and wonders if the man can actually sleep, because he's often in positions that Sebastian-Stitch would consider - complicated. He twists and turns and is never still for long, and Sebastian-Stitch listens to him whisper in his sleep.

Again Sebastian-Stitch scratches his scalp. 

For a moment he considers putting his head under running water. It seems to be one of Chris's favored methods for waking himself up in the mornings, and there's no reason to think it might not work on him. 

But he does not enjoy the sensation of water warming on his skin, drops running down the back of his neck. It makes his skin crawl, makes him want to throw fireballs, and Chris has requested he refrain from doing so - at least inside the house.

So Sebastian-Stitch gnaws on his knuckles, tries to stay awake.

A very soft roaring starts up from just outside. When Sebastian-Stitch hears it, he drops out of his chair and into a crouch, ready to spring, ready to attack.

At the same time, Chris startles, yelps, very nearly falls out of his bed - Sebastian-Stitch tenses, looks at him, calculates the probability of having to catch him - 

"Is it raining?" Chris asks, when he struggles upright.

Sebastian-Stitch looks at him, blankly. 

"D'you get any rain where you came from? I can't remember. I'm sure you told me and now I can't remember. I'm sorry. I forget things."

"I didn't tell you, because I don't know."

"Oh. Well. Want to check it out?" Here Chris seems to check himself. "Oh, but - it's water out of the sky. Precipitation. You can stay inside the door, if you like."

"Water falling out of the sky," Sebastian-Stitch says. "Like when it comes out of your shower."

"Only rain comes from the entire sky."

Sebastian-Stitch nods, and watches as Chris scrubs the sleep from his eyes. It is very, very late at night. Sebastian-Stitch thinks Chris must go to work in a few hours.

Chris doesn't bother to put a shirt on; he just opens the door and walks straight out into the - rain, Sebastian-Stitch thinks. Hissing soft fall. Sebastian-Stitch follows him as far as the threshold, and holds a hand out into the rain. It feels warm on his skin.

"Why do you do that?" he asks, after a moment. "Is it that you need to wash? But you have a functioning shower unit. And you'll need soap. I can get it for you if you like."

"I do this because I like the rain," Chris says as he tilts his face upwards, toward the sky, toward the falling rain. "It reminds me of home."

"This is not your home. I remember. You told me."

"This is not the place where I was born," Chris corrects. "Hawaii is - home, for now. Not the place where my family and friends are. Just the home I chose."

"I don't have a home." Sebastian-Stitch thinks he wasn't made to find one of those. "And I don't have a place of birth."

"Yeah, I think you're wrong on one of those," Chris says, and he turns around, sits down on the sand just outside the door.

Sebastian-Stitch tilts his head at him. "Explain."

"Well, you're here, aren't you? You walk on the beach in the daytime, when you can be persuaded to move, and you come back here when you're done walking. You keep the place cleaner than I ever did, except when you sometimes trail sand in, and that's okay, I'm guilty of that too. You have a place to go to, while you're here. Doesn't that count for something?"

"I don't know, because I don't know what a home is."

"Well, you've got time and space to figure it out. You'd be doing the same thing I'm doing."

"You are - looking for home."

"Something like that," Chris says.

Sebastian-Stitch stares at the rain until it fades away with the sigh of the night wind, until the clouds part and turn back into starry fields, and out of the corner of his eye he can see the odd soft smile on Chris's face, and he has no references for that, either.


	9. Chapter 9

Another day out on the water. 

Something about today is different, Chris thinks, though he's more than familiar with his surroundings. The sweeping vault of the sky above. The gentle swell of the sea below. Waves, rocking him back and forth; and the shrieking clamor of the seabirds.

Thunder mutters, distant, maybe friendly - he looks up at the sky, blue-gray spackled with great-bellied sailing clouds - and he's not surprised when the wind follows suit, brushing colder-than-usual fingers against the back of his neck.

He paddles out further, till the waves catch at him, try to lift him up, and he lets them.

The great hand of a sea-swell seizes him, and he struggles to a standing position on his board. Arms out for balance, the board shaking minutely from side to side with the force of the onrushing water, and Chris skids down the wave and finally falls face-first into the water, one hand up to his face in time to hold his nose shut so it doesn't hurt when he goes under - 

He emerges, and the seawater streams down his face, down his throat, off his shoulders. He's tethered to the board, so it's an easy enough operation to reel it in and then think about going out for one more ride - he glances between the breakers out to sea and the inviting curve of the shore.

One more, he thinks, and then he'll go in. He could use a cold drink. 

The winds whip up, higher and stronger, and the sea responds with equal strength: the wave that Chris paddles toward is easily twice the size of the previous one, capped with roiling white foam.

And the ride in is rough and angry, tumbling force propelling him onward, and just as he catches sight of Sebastian-Stitch standing on the shore the board hits a rough patch and - his feet are swept out from underneath him.

Sky, surf, and the shore, rolling around him, rolling toward him, faster and faster - 

Chris thinks he catches a glimpse of Sebastian-Stitch's face, thinks he catches a glint of worry in those strange eyes, a hand reaching out for him - 

He hits the water like running full-tilt into a brick wall.

Tossed and buffeted by the rough surf, rolling hard for the sand - his ears are ringing and over that he can just faintly hear a voice, someone, muttering vehemently. Swearing? It's not in any language he's heard, and he's heard quite a few, short sojourn on Hawaiian shores or not. 

Chris is hauled up onto the sand by arms not his own. Too much salt in his eyes. Suddenly it's hard to lift a hand to his face, but somehow he manages it, just as he's laid out on something that feels very much like a mostly dry towel -

He opens his eyes, blinking stinging seawater away - and looks up, upside down, into the face of Sebastian-Stitch.

Who looks concerned and angry and confused all at once.

Chris attempts to raise himself up on his elbows. His muscles do not respond to him. He feels like he's been rolling around in a particularly vigorous wash cycle, as though he'd been a heap of dirty laundry. 

So he settles for a weak smile and a croak of "Hi."

"Hi," Sebastian-Stitch replies, bright flash of brilliant brief smile, and then his face falls back into those unhappy lines. "What were you doing?"

He sounds honestly confused, and Chris suddenly feels like he's gone on a puppy-kicking spree - remorse and apologies welling up inside him, pricking at his skin.

"I got reckless," Chris says, and it's even half the truth. "I just wanted to see if I could ride a wave as big as that one had been."

"Now you know."

"I do. I might not do it again. It punches like - well, like you maybe might."

Again that flash of bright amusement, sharp around the edges. "You do not want to know how hard I can hit something."

"You're right, I don't." He holds his arms out to Sebastian-Stitch, and is lifted to his feet in response. Careful pinch of claws against his skin, which is surprisingly soothing.

Chris is glad for the immense strength of Sebastian-Stan, who all but hauls him bodily home.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think that now we actually have a tiny smidgen of Plot. :)

There is a humming in his bones that has nothing to do with the hum of the waves that crash upon the seashore.

It has nothing to do with the steady thrumming light of the stars as they burn through their lives.

It has nothing to do with the sea breezes or with the steady in and out of Chris's breathing, and it has everything to do with a possible danger to these things.

It started a week ago, Sebastian-Stitch thinks, as he makes another round of Chris's cramped quarters and, again, stops in the same place as he has for the last three rounds.

Tucked away into the back of the small living space is a sink, a counter, two cupboards leaning drunkenly upon each other. In one of the cupboards there is a knife block. In that knife block there are six small knives, not really worth counting, and two larger knives.

Sebastian-Stitch considers the larger of the two knives. It is a little too light for his tastes. But it seems to hold an edge well, and it fits his hand exactly, and it is not much for a weapon but he will take any advantage he can get.

The moonlight in the room vanishes, and he crosses to the single window, and he looks up into a sky freighted with clouds.

He turns one hand palm upward, and concentrates carefully. The bright spark he creates is enough to illuminate the room and most of its corners.

A soft breath, very close by, and words. Perhaps a song of some kind. Chris talks in his sleep. Dreams. Memories.

The memory in Sebastian-Stitch's mind has everything to do with pain and with cold cold eyes, with the screams of being torn to pieces and being put back together. Haphazard, that. Spliced genetic material, and sometimes it would integrate painlessly and sometimes there would be no integration at all. Twisting and screaming and being turned inside-out.

Danger.

He will not let anything dangerous happen to Chris.

The spark in his hand lights his way as, at last, he crosses back to the cupboard. He's learned to move around very quietly, even here, and he knows how to open things just as silently. 

Gleaming blade. Sebastian-Stitch carefully tests the edge against the skin of his opposite wrist. It takes some pressure before he can feel the bite of the knife, not enough to draw blood, because he doesn't want to give Chris the wrong ideas. The edge is a little bit dull. There are no sharpening devices in this house.

He uses his claw instead, and he runs one edge of the knife over the rough surface, and then the other. The same movements, over and over again. There is something curiously soothing about the repetition. 

On the last pass he almost neatly slices through his claw instead, and he inspects the knife-edge, and nods, satisfied. Now the knife is a weapon. Now he can use the knife.

Chris sleeps, undisturbed, and Sebastian-Stitch pads back to the window. He places himself between the outside world and the man in the bed, who twists heedlessly through his dreams, who does not know that he is protected.

He's only ever wanted to protect himself. Now he's learning what it might be like to protect another.

Sebastian-Stitch yawns, fights off the long days and nights of guard duty, and keeps his eyes fixed on the stars.

Still his bones hum, and still he feels the spark of danger on the move.

He waits. He has to be awake to meet that danger when it comes. If it comes. He has to be ready.

Chris must be protected.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (yes, as it turned out, this chapter got written on Sebastian's actual birthday, so this is my sort-of present for him)

Chris rings up the dark-haired woman's purchases - an extra-large bottle of sunblock, a pretty and very thin scarf in several shades of blue, four hula-girl keychains, and, incongruously, a bright yellow rubber ducky - and he carefully counts out her change, and he can't help but smile when she says "Thank you!", bright startling and she waves at him as she steps out the door, and into a circle of rather tall people, one of whom sweeps her up onto his back with a huge and hearty laugh.

He smiles, and looks down at his feet, before shaking it off and tidying up the register. It's something he does, when there's no one in the store. He likes to bag up the coins in advance, make sure the bills are facing right-sides up. He updates the running tally of things sold. 

The bell at the door rings again, and a rowdy group comes in trailing sand and the smell of the airport, and Chris glowers at least one of them into not messing up the shirt-racks too much - but he doesn't smile when he serves them at the register and then sees them out, and he sighs and shakes his head and goes to sweep up the floors.

And then Anthony comes back in from his lunch break and says, "Yeah, before you ask, before anything else, _he's_ here, in his usual spot. Not exactly next door. How he managed to get on the roof without anyone hearing him is beyond me. You got some kinda explanation, brah?"

"None," Chris says, and he carefully carries the dustpan out the back door. Sand grains a-glitter on the soft wind. 

Chris looks up, and there's Sebastian-Stitch, just barely visible on the roof of the flower shop next door.

He looks over his shoulder. Anthony's got the till. He can spare a few minutes.

He steps out onto the path leading away from the shop, and looks up, calling softly. "Hey."

"Aloha," Sebastian-Stitch says, and the word is surrounded by the sounds of crinkling paper. 

When Chris looks up there's sugar still left on Sebastian-Stitch's lips, and he shakes his head and smiles, because he now knows what Anthony's been feeding Sebastian-Stitch with for the past couple of days. "You really like malasadas, don't you?"

"Only the plain ones."

"I'm not much of a fan of the ones with fillings, either. If I wanted one of those I'd - I'd maybe go home. Back to Chicago. I should ask my mom to ship us some, when she's got time, when I've a little money to spare."

"Donuts," Sebastian-Stitch says, tilting his head. "Are they as good as malasadas?"

"If you get them from the right place, they're even better than," Chris says. 

He watches Sebastian-Stitch pull his eyebrows into a straight line, which means that he's thinking. 

"Are you still not telling me why you're following me to and from work? Why you're watching over me?"

"I already said," Sebastian-Stitch says, grave and quiet and serious. "You might be in danger. I will not allow anything or anyone to harm you." Pause. Blink. "Why do you not believe me?"

"I'm sorry, that's not what I meant, I mean I know you're staying up and I know about the knife," Chris says, spreading his hands. "I just don't get the part about me being in danger. No one gets mugged around here. The stores don't get broken into."

He thinks that the only danger there is to him, is himself: is his own thoughts, his own doubts, his own worries.

"I do not care about other people or other places. I care about your safety. I care about your home being protected."

"From what?"

Sebastian-Stitch shakes his head. "It is a feeling in my bones. Danger is coming. I will meet it head-on. I was made to fight. I will fight to see you safe."

And what else can he say to that? What else can he say about the odd kind of warmth that prickles in his hands? He'd like to take Sebastian-Stitch's hand. But he doesn't know why, so he won't, and he'll do something else. Something else like look after Sebastian-Stitch.

So Chris says, "I'm going to get something to eat. You want anything?"

"More malasadas," Sebastian-Stitch says, perfectly straight-faced, and Chris laughs. So he's going to protect Chris all hopped up on sugar; okay, Chris can live with that.


	12. interlude: space oddity

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please do not adjust your receivers.

\- We have determined the location of the escaped experiment.

\- Increase power to lightspeed engines. We must not waste any more time. 

\- Ready conditioning apparatus. 

\- Escaped experiment will resist. 

\- Operating theater is prepared for that situation. 

\- Destination: Sol system. Third planet. Terra, also referred to as "Earth". Abundant evidence of organic life. Among the dominant species is _Homo sapiens_. Bipedal, walks upright, primitive culture. Attempts at space travel stymied by political infighting and misuse of resources. Multiple civilizations, evidence of infighting and several types of warfare. Sporadic attempts at contact from multiple spacefaring races, result: nil.

\- Capturing the escaped experiment with minimal casualties would be ideal. However, we are also aware of the belligerent nature of aforementioned escaped experiment. Deploy and and all means necessary for takedown. 

\- Pertinent detail: Terra is distinguished from other planetary bodies in its system by an abundance of water.

\- Escaped experiment is useless in water.

\- Consider leading escaped experiment into water. We can retrieve, immobilize, begin conditioning process more easily.

\- Orders acknowledged.


	13. Chapter 13

A whisper of shivering pressure, a whisper of displaced air, a whisper of the broken rhythm of the waves.

Sebastian-Stitch looks around, and his mind is full of tactics and calculations, and the moment he hears the heedless quiet steps of someone approaching the door of the shop where Chris works with Anthony he springs into action.

The leap to the flagstone path is as nothing, light and rolling onto his feet, and he slams his hand against the door, pushing it back closed. Flash of Chris's face on the other side. His words are muffled and understandable: "What's going on?"

"Danger," Sebastian-Stitch says - and as soon as the word leaves his mouth he hears the sound he's been waiting for, the sound he's been preparing for.

Engines turning over. Sublight drives kicking in. They begin like a faint roar on the horizon and grow louder with every passing moment.

Sebastian-Stitch draws the knife from its makeshift scabbard at his hip and tenses for action. How many would they send against him, first? Initial wave: more force or more speed? He bares his teeth. He growls. Over his shoulder, he says, "Lock the doors. Close your windows. Chris?" He risks a look. "I said I will fight to keep you safe."

Swearing, behind him, not all of it in Chris's voice.

He has no time to parse the words because as soon as he notices the advancing shadows he _moves_ : he flows forward, slashing and striking, claws and knife in concert. Environmental suits and the hiss of both vented breaths and shocked voiceless cries.

He's never seen anything like the organisms he's currently fighting. That doesn't matter. He's been built to fight anything and everything. Bipedal organisms tend to similar body plans. He goes for the vital points, all he knows, and he's soon covered in - spilled blood and spilled air and whatever else his enemies are carrying around in their environmental suits. No room for complacency. He cannot leave any of these organisms alive. They've come here to threaten him or they've come here to threaten Chris. He won't allow them to get close, not to Chris.

He ducks, rolls, fetches right up against an opponent's legs and he leaps, cutting and clawing, lands on his feet and takes another one out with a kick and a stab and a punch.

A lull. Has he finished off the first wave? He thinks as rapidly as he can. His opponents can decide to rush him while he's coming down from this fighting frenzy, or they could be holding back, waiting for him to move. He could charge, find where they'd come from, but that would mean leaving Chris alone. Or - 

He bounds back to the shop, to the splattered door. The wood and the glass shatter with one blow from his fist. 

"Chris," he says.

A familiar face peeks out from around one of the shelves. No fear in Chris's eyes. His voice doesn't shake. "All done?" he asks.

Sebastian-Stitch shakes his head. "They may just be getting started. We must move. Come with me."

He's expecting resistance. He's not expecting Chris to move, cautiously, towards him.

"If we get out of here they won't target the shop, right?"

Sebastian-Stitch nods, impressed.

"Then let's go - but _where_ \- "

"Mountains," Sebastian-Stitch decides.

"Oookay. We're going to need transportation."

"No. We must go on foot. Or I will. I can carry you."

He watches as Chris shakes his head. "Which will wear you out and then where will we be? I can do this for you at least." 

He hurries after Chris, out the back door of the shop, towards a small square of paved road, and he notices the bright silverflash of metal in Chris's hand as they approach a four-wheeled vehicle. A loud beep makes him tense, makes him hiss, but Chris only opens one of the doors and gets in, and says, "Come on!"

"Do you know how to operate this thing?" Sebastian-Stitch asks as he climbs onto the roof.

"Get _in here_ ," Chris shouts, and then, "Just because you've only seen me wipe out on my surfboard doesn't mean I can't drive." His last words are soon drowned out by the roar of what is presumably this vehicle's engines.

"Debatable," he tells Chris, and then, "Does this thing fly?"

"I wish!"

The vehicle, when Chris gets it moving, is considerably faster than Sebastian-Stitch's own running speed. 

"Watch the road," he tells Chris, and he opens a circle in the glass window with one claw. "I will watch the skies."

"Are we really going for the mountains?" Chris half-yells.

"If you wish others to be spared this fight."

"Now that's just fighting dirty." But the vehicle starts moving even more quickly, and Chris looks determined, from the few looks that Sebastian-Stitch can steal of him when he's not busy watching in every other direction.

He clutches his knife more firmly. He would still fight were he deprived of it. 

For Chris.

This is what he knows.


	14. Chapter 14

Mountains, Chris thinks, and if only this were some kind of joyride, but it's not.

Not with Sebastian-Stitch in the shotgun seat, and Chris would still be side-eyeing him even if he weren't covered in blood and whatever else is coloring his skin in lurid shades of green.

(Green blood? _Green blood_ or something. Honestly.)

He's not angry, he's worried, and that's what's making him put the pedal to the metal. Engine roar loud in his ears, and he should be paying attention to the breakneck curves in the road ahead but there are too many things caroming around madly in his head. He feels like a pinball machine, all lit up and jangling, and he can't think. He needs to think. He's not about to send them crashing into the sea, and that's not least because Sebastian-Stitch would be useless in the water.

Something is telling Chris that he's got to prevent that from happening.

So he grits his teeth and drives and the world before him swerves and narrows and drops away, down one steep slope only to climb another, and the waves keep crashing ominously below. Salt in his teeth, sweat on his palms, and Sebastian-Stitch next to him, baring his teeth at the sky.

"Hey," Chris says, "maybe it'd help if you, I don't know, told me about those mooks. They're after you. They think they've got a good reason to go after you."

"I was made to be a weapon. They collect weapons. They use weapons."

There's a terrifying matter-of-factness in those words, and it makes Chris want to scream and want to stand between those _things_ and Sebastian-Stitch, because like hell anyone's taking Sebastian-Stitch away from him. Not something he's interested in at all. Sebastian-Stitch is with him.

The ribbon of the road disappears into trees and Chris may or may not heave a sigh of relief as he drives into lush green heat and shadow. 

Of course, trust Sebastian-Stitch to say something like "We are not out of danger," just when Chris tries to pry his hands from the steering wheel.

When he hears those words Chris yelps and tries to glare at him and watch the road at the same time. "Why the hell not? Trees! Shelter! They have to be unfamiliar with the, the terrain, right? Have those - enemies of yours ever _been_ here?"

"Immaterial. They will have weaponry that they can use in this kind of environment. What we need to do is find their ship, or their command ship if there is more than one, and board it, and turn their own weapons against them."

"More than one?! Holy shit," Chris says, and then he has to grit his teeth because the road's starting to get bumpy. He casts an anxious glance at the fuel gauge. The tank's full, for now, but he doesn't know how much driving he has left to do, and at what speed, and like hell he's going to stop to fill 'er up. That's just asking for trouble. Especially since, oh yes, there might be more than one enemy ship out there, and he's got Sebastian-Stitch, but. Yeah. 

Just the two of them against what could possibly be an enemy - _fleet_ , he thinks, a little desperately. An enemy armada. The synonyms come tumbling out of his wrong-kind-of-helpful brain. 

Why are those things even here?

What have they come for?

Sebastian-Stitch's words: _I was made to be a weapon._

No no no no no.

More shadows, more bumps in the road, and he's starting to get paranoid, because he thinks he's seeing movement in the trees ahead - 

"Chris," Sebastian-Stitch says.

He doesn't know why he says it now. "You've got me," he tells the person in the shotgun seat. Not a weapon, not prey, not a target. His friend. Someone who's looked after him. Someone he looks after. His friend. They might be friends. 

There must be some kind of weapon in this goddamn clunker. A lug wrench. He can at least try to defend himself. 

Objectively he knows he's helpless in a fight like this but - if he's armed, if he has something to hit things with, he might be able to help. Might.

The trees ahead of them _are_ moving.

Chris doesn't jump out of his skin when Sebastian-Stitch's hand touches his, only reaches out and grabs that hand, holds it tight, just until he has to let go -


	15. Chapter 15

He wants to keep holding on to Chris's hand - unexpected kindness, unexpected strength - but there are shadows moving onto the leaf-littered path, falling out of the trees. He has to let go. A brief howling eternity of something very much like _loss_ , like losing something vital, like the first plunge into water, the first time he'd ever screamed in fear.

And then - the enemy is here.

"Look away, cover your eyes," he growls at Chris, and he only has a moment to take in the fact that somehow Chris has armed himself - the bar might be heavy, if the grimace on Chris's face is any indication - before he punches clean through the front glass. No splinters. Surprising that this planet has figured that secret out. The entire plate flies out whole and is lost in the trees behind them as he crawls out onto the front of the vehicle. 

He glances up. Engines, getting louder, getting closer. The trees are old and green and they block out almost all of the sky. He can _hear_ those ships, those sublight drives, and he can't see them, but the sound helps, and he braces himself.

And then the first punch, the first volley, bright beams of light lancing out, bodies in protective armor falling onto and around the vehicle, and he deflects them with the arm that isn't busy with the knife. He works the blade as methodically as he can: find the nearest vital point, slash and stab, claws if needed, and out. Next target. One wave after another, and he moves quickly, and the enemies fall below him and all the while Chris is still propelling them both onward. From time to time a gasp behind the steering wheel and, once, a loud yell that might have been an obscenity.

A fist moving in Chris's direction - Sebastian-Stitch roars, lunges forward, and the tip of the knife meets more resistance, and then none, as he stabs Chris's would-be attacker clean through the throat. 

"Hold on to something!" Chris yells.

Sebastian-Stitch grins, digs into screeching metal with his claws.

A hard banking curve in the path - Chris throws them right into it, breakneck speed, and there's an angry cry from one of the attackers. Black shadow flying off into the thick foliage. 

Sebastian-Stitch grins, waves, tilts his head back, and the wind of Chris's driving roars in his ears, a clean sound, something that mixes with the beat of his own heart and makes him think of calm and of deep space.

The path starts to fall and the forest starts to thin out around them, and now Sebastian-Stitch can see the sky clearly, can see the ships in pursuit and - he growls, angrily, as with another roar a bigger ship rises out of the sea, right in their path, impending head-on collision - 

He looks up at the pursuing ships, sleek-lined fighters, and he looks at Chris's pale shocked face, and he looks at the bright blue sky and the glint of the sea, frothing waves, and he knows what he needs to do.

He leans in, towards Chris, and there's something in him that leaps with savage joy when despite the fear in Chris's wide-open eyes he leans in as well.

Hard to speak over the sheer speed of the vehicle, but he manages it: "When you get to the next curve, stop as hard as you can."

Chris's reaction is an immediate scream: "That's _the sea_ down there, not to mention the fuckin' cliffs. Rocks! What the hell are you thinking - "

"I am thinking of what I must do," Sebastian-Stitch says, "so that I can finish this fight."

"You're finishing nothing if you go into the water!"

"Then I won't," he tells Chris, and he glances over his shoulder, calculates angles and heights and velocities. "Almost there. As soon as I have leapt clear, get out of here - hide until all the ships are gone. It is me they want. They will leave you alone as soon as I - "

Chris shakes his head angrily, frantically. "Don't leave me!"

"I must. Ready? There is the curve, Chris, as fast as you can and then stop - "

A torrent of words, of obscenities, but they are not directed _at_ him, they are being said _for_ him, and that is all right. He cannot be offended.

"Fuck," is the last thing he hears Chris say and even that is drowned out by the screech of brakes, the roar of following engines. 

Sebastian-Stitch lets go. Keeps moving. Gravity, momentum, speed, and the glimpse of Chris's hand over his mouth - 

"Thank you," Sebastian-Stitch whispers as he tumbles over the edge of the cliff, into free-fall.


	16. Chapter 16

Chris spends exactly five seconds that he doesn't have staring as Sebastian-Stitch plunges out of sight.

"No no no no no," Chris says, frantic, and he brakes to a halt and nearly bangs his idiot head on the steering wheel before he lurches out onto the shoulder and - he can't stop. Can't think. Sebastian-Stitch is falling, _falling into the fucking sea_ , and Sebastian-Stitch needs him. 

Something buzzes past him, very nearly on top of him, some kind of aircraft in hot pursuit of Sebastian-Stitch, and Chris would take a moment to admire the sleek lines and whatever it is about that aircraft that makes it look deadly - but no, he doesn't have time, and in fact that flyby just reminds him of what he has to do.

He throws the lug wrench away, and runs to the edge of the cliff - he can still see Sebastian-Stitch falling - and he's scared, he's never been more scared in his entire _life_.

He jumps in after Sebastian-Stitch anyway. Remembers to pull his arms and legs in, falling blindly and so very quickly, and praying to whatever or whoever might want to be listening to him just about now, because he needs to reach Sebastian-Stitch and - 

THUMP, goes something below him. 

Alien aircraft. Sebastian-Stitch landing on it, steady and deliberate as he smashes its dome in, brief glimpse of bared teeth, and Chris yells in relief - and to warn him: "Wait for me!"

Sebastian-Stitch's eyes, wide and startled, and this is actually the first time Chris has ever, ever seen him surprised and he's a little proud, and he's also pathetically grateful when Sebastian-Stitch simply and effortlessly plucks him out of the sky.

Something roars next to their joined hands.

He glances at Sebastian-Stitch and reaches into the hole with him, grabs a weapon and then the hand holding that weapon and together he and Sebastian-Stitch throw something or someone black-suited out and into the roaring surf.

"Inside!"

Chris is happy to scramble in and he's still grinning one moment later, after Sebastian-Stitch growls something at a bank of lit-up controls in lurid shades of orange and green, before rounding on him, furious, teeth bared: "Chris. _What are you doing._ "

Chris wants to laugh, and settles for collapsing onto the floor, and he just barely misses the edge of something that looks like a chair. "I don't know! I just - I knew I had to jump in after you - if you'd hit the water I'd have - "

"You could have died."

"And if I didn't then I would have helped you back up to the surface. I can swim. Doggy paddle. At least helped you keep afloat." He's giddy, he's reckless, he's high. He's alive, and Sebastian-Stitch is not in the water - Sebastian-Stitch, in fact, is sitting in the chair and he's already reaching for the controls, hands moving, though his eyes never leave Chris's face. 

"Why?"

"If you think you're gonna be able to defeat those guys by yourself, you better think again," Chris says. He motions to the controls with a shaky hand. "Teach me how to fly this thing. We'll take one of the other flying things. Then we'll go after the big one. Together."

Maybe he shouldn't have said that, he thinks, next, because right on the heels of the words comes a brief barrage of explosions, fire-borne turbulence. The fighter rocks from side to side, and he nearly topples over. He just barely catches himself on his hands.

Sebastian-Stitch is still staring at him.

Chris stares back.

"Why," Sebastian-Stitch says again, but there's something soft and strange and wondering about that particular question, and that makes Chris smile. "Come here," Sebastian-Stitch says next.

He does. 

Claws pointing to controls. "Directions here: forward, backward, upward, downward. Wings here: tilt left, tilt right. Speed here: forward to go faster, backward to go slower." Is Sebastian-Stitch smiling? "Right hand here," he says, taking Chris's wrist, and Chris nods, sighs softly, lets himself be directed. "Keep it on that red panel there."

"What does the red panel do?"

Sebastian-Stitch _is_ smiling. "The red panel is for shooting. Left side for lasers, right side for torpedoes."

"Oh," Chris says, and he leaves his hand lightly touching that red panel. "So you're going to let me go with you, then."

"I hope that you will not fall out of the sky," is all the reply he gets, however. "I will just go and fetch us another one of these fighters. The communications interface is next to the red panel. I will inform you when it is time to go after, as you say, the big one." 

Chris nods, looks around briefly for some kind of seat belt, finds nothing.

Nothing, that is, except for Sebastian-Stitch's smile, and the warmth of one clawed hand on his shoulder. "Chris?"

He looks up from the controls. "Yeah."

What Sebastian-Stitch says makes him smile. "I have never done anything like this before. Any of this. Fighting by someone's side. Falling out of the sky."

"You know how to fight," he says.

"I do. But I used to fight alone. Just me, against everything else. This - this is not that. I am not alone."

"Fuck no you're not. You've got me," Chris says.

"Yes. And you have me." Now Sebastian-Stitch is wrapping his hand around Chris's right wrist again. "I - I will be right with you."

And Chris's heart is in his throat as Sebastian-Stitch scrambles out. As his shadow and his weight leave Chris's commandeered craft. And there his heart stays until - "Chris."


	17. Chapter 17

Chris is either very, very lucky, or he has a hitherto hidden talent for flying spacecraft and fighting in them, because this is the fourth time that Sebastian-Stitch has had to dodge away from yet another enemy fighter that's been blasted into pieces.

The sky is clearing.

He bares his teeth and pours another shot of laser power into the fighter that's been trying to sneak up on Chris, and that, too, falls out of the sky, trailing smoke and fire and shattered edges.

Crackling on the comm lines. He touches the panel. "Chris."

"Are we all clear?" Chris sounds like he's been running, sounds like he's been riding the waves. "Is there anything else?"

"Nothing left but the big one."

"All right! Boss fight!" 

"Chris," Sebastian-Stitch says. He does not want to leave him behind. He does not want to put him at risk.

His mind is rearranging itself. Different thoughts. Different emotions. He had landed on a planet that was mostly water, that was mostly primitive, that was so far away from galactic importance as to be no more than a designation and a brief handful of statistics - and on this mostly unimportant planet he had found turtles wading into saltwater shallows, coffee mixed with ice and cream and sugar, malasadas, _A Brief History of Time_ and _Dune_ , and the incessant call-and-response argument of the winging seagulls. 

Here he had found Chris.

And now he has to leave the planet, leave this person, leave that cramped ramshackle house sheltered by trees and rain. 

If he gives himself up to those who have been hunting him, he can attempt to bargain, or force it down their throats with claw and plasma blast. 

If he goes with them willingly, if he submits to what they have planned for him, perhaps he cam make it so that this planet, this Earth, is spared their horrors and their conquest.

If he leaves with those who would be his captors, he will have to lose Chris.

He would have given this place up had he been the same being who had crash-landed. He had been contemptuous then. Consumed by a mindless rage.

He will not betray this place that has given him the time and the space to find a new point of view. A new equilibrium. 

"Sebastian-Stitch," Chris says, or perhaps he asks, and perhaps Chris can sense what he is thinking, and that might make things easier or make things much more difficult. 

"Chris," Sebastian-Stitch says again. "I cannot take you with me. The mothership for those enemy fighters will be docked in low orbit. Between atmosphere and space. Your fighter is compromised. How do you intend to fight?"

The response is immediate, and it is the response Sebastian-Stitch wants to hear and cannot accept. "I'll go with you. You can maybe pick me up from here and - and I'll help you fly that fighter, not that you need help because you're a really kickass pilot - I'll do something. Anything. I'll go with you."

Sebastian-Stitch closes his eyes and bows his head. "I am afraid that I cannot do that. As much as I would want it. I cannot."

"Why," is the soft and shocked question. "You - we've already been through this. I told you. _Please don't leave me._ "

"And _I_ told you. I will fight to keep you safe." Sebastian-Stitch swallows. Difficult thing to do. It feels like the knife he was carrying has somehow lodged itself in his throat. Breathing is painful and speaking to Chris opens wounds in his thoughts. "I will leave you in order to keep you safe."

"No. Please. Don't."

"What else is there to be done, Chris?"

"What else is there but - you and me, together?"

"I do not know how. I cannot guarantee your safety. I cannot predict all possible outcomes. Or perhaps it is that my mind will not predict those outcomes in which I lose you to an opponent. I cannot, will not, allow that to happen."

"Sebastian-Stitch?"

He looks out at the sky. He cannot see the clouds, cannot see the rich colors of the impending sunset. "Chris."

"Come and get me from this fighter. Or - or stay there. I'm crossing to you."

Sebastian-Stitch's hands spasm on the controls. He could do as Chris says. He could speed away. He could shoot Chris's fighter out of the sky: a single precise shot will incapacitate the engine and send Chris falling, down and safely into the sea. 

Decisions.

"Please," Chris whispers.

Sebastian-Stitch makes a sound.

He engages the controls.


	18. Chapter 18

Chris looks up into the dazzling sunset painted onto Hawaiian afternoon skies, reds and golds and pinks and faint faraway deeper colors, dusk and night on the inexorable march of minutes and hours. Soon all the flames will be extinguished in a bright blanket of stars and - if Chris is lucky - the calm light of the Milky Way, a river of stars and planets and dark matter that he is a part of and that is a part of his night sky.

And he sees not the sunset, not the coming night, not the constant river of the stars, but blank space, blank emptiness, and a looming blank-faced threat hanging, just between the edge of atmosphere and the edge of space.

Space, and the cliches are hoary and outdated and well beyond worn-out, but space: it's a yawning void, it's eternal blackness, and bit by bit it opens up inside Chris. It is consuming his heart, now, and soon it will consume all the rest of him, leaving him a human-shaped hole in the world, because why would Sebastian-Stitch heed him, why would Sebastian-Stitch come out of the sky for him once again as he already had - 

Engine roar. Exhaust, heat and fumes, and a voice full of worry and of jagged edges and - Chris has to believe - a voice full of a smile.

Sebastian-Stitch's voice.

And he clambers out of the hole in his fighter's canopy. The flaming sky above and around him, and somewhere far below is the Hawaiian surf. 

Sebastian-Stitch is suddenly climbing out of a neat door? - hatch? - something, emerging from his own fighter. A clawed hand held out.

Chris smiles, and he thinks it might not be his best smile because there's relief in it and not a few unshed tears, and he reaches out. Takes that hand. The sharp points of those claws dig comfortably and comfortingly into his skin, and Chris is still afraid - he's been afraid all throughout these dealings with strange aliens who are _not_ Sebastian-Stitch - but he's here, and he's stepping through the sky and he's following Sebastian-Stitch back into a now-familiar cockpit. 

The fighter does not really have enough space for two beings. Chris wants to hunch in on himself. Make himself small. He is, after all, excess baggage; he's grateful to have been taken on at all - 

"Chris," Sebastian-Stitch says, and why does he sound like that?

Chris gives in to the impulse to take both of those steady hands in his. Sebastian-Stitch's hands. Lots of differences between his hands and Sebastian-Stitch's. The claws are just the beginning. Tougher skin. More flexible sinews and bones. He's seen Sebastian-Stitch poke holes in a coconut to sip at its mildly sweet water. Power, raw or refined as needed. 

"The beings out there, what you would call aliens," Sebastian-Stitch is now saying, "want to take me. Want to use me. They will stop at nothing to get what they want."

"They won't get you," Chris tells him. What a flimsy promise that is. What can he do against these aliens, when Sebastian-Stitch looks for all the world like he's _afraid_? 

But he means every word of that promise. Every ragtag emotion he's still got left in him. Sebastian-Stitch doesn't want to go with the bad guys. He'll do anything and everything he can, no matter how minuscule that might turn out to be. He'll make sure Sebastian-Stitch believes him. 

And he starts in the here and now, by letting Sebastian-Stitch go - only to open his arms to him, and to enfold him in a hug.

"I've been wanting to do that for a while," Chris mutters into Sebastian-Stitch's dark-and-blue hair. "Is this all right?"

"I - I do not know what to do, in a situation like this," is the answer, hesitant but not resisting. 

He can actually feel Sebastian-Stitch leaning in against him.

Chris laughs, softly. Pulls him closer. "Do what I just did. You can put your arms around me."

Heavy weights around his waist. 

Chris holds his breath.

And then Sebastian-Stitch hugs him back, brief press against him from shoulders to knees.

They let go, together.

The fighter craft allows them to hang serenely in the darkening sky.

But there are enemies lurking just out of sight. Not just aliens who want to take Sebastian-Stitch and turn him into a meat puppet of a weapon, a mindless engine of destruction. There are worse things. Anxiety. Things left unsaid. Worry. 

Fear.

His fear of being left behind, and Sebastian-Stitch's fear of going under.

Harder enemies to fight, that they've faced in the deeps of the night, together.

"We can do this," Chris says. He has to believe it so that Sebastian-Stitch can believe it, too. So he puts conviction into his voice: conviction born from waking up from nightmares to the steady gaze of those vertical-slit pupils.

After a moment, he feels Sebastian-Stitch nod. A brushing movement against his shoulder. 

They are breathing together, Chris realizes. In. Out. Steady. Synchronized.

And they break away from the embrace as though they are one being in two bodies. Briefly he might ache for the loss of Sebastian-Stitch's steadiness and warmth and utter _presence_ in the moment, but the ache is quickly soothed as he follows Sebastian-Stitch to the controls. They don't use the chair; there's only one of those.

Instead they stand side by side and lights flash in readiness beneath their hands.

The fighter croons around them, a strange sound, as it bears them up into the sky, through thinning sunset blaze, towards a shadow in the distance that eclipses the stars.

That shadow grows and grows, and Chris reaches out for Sebastian-Stitch's hand. A brief squeeze. Reassurance. The promise from earlier, repeated, silently.

Sebastian-Stitch smiles.


	19. epilogue: you and me and the waves of Hawaii

He's clumsy and high on adrenaline, and so is Chris, and for a very long moment they hang between space and sky.

Environment suits, right, pressure and air supply and inertial regulators, a panel of green lights coming on in his heads-up display, slow, slow, too slow.

Chris is wide-eyed, and he holds on to Sebastian-Stitch as though he must be screaming without voice, screaming until his breath gives out, because they're in free-fall, the two of them falling, and gravity is an unimaginable weight bearing them down and down and down.

Gravity, like the force that had thrown him to Chris, that had pushed him and Chris together, just as they jumped - 

Atmosphere reaches up around them, claims them, and Sebastian-Stitch curls around Chris, protectively, rolling in mid-air and tucking Chris in, closer, and all around them falling fire and a ship ripped to shreds: because they'd boarded the craft from whence their own fighter had come, because they'd shot out the engines, because Chris had taken one long shocked look at the machines that had been prepared for Sebastian-Stitch and - he'd gone berserk. He'd snatched a weapon from the nearest fallen enemy. He'd started shooting. Every shot striking a machine, silencing its ready humming. 

And when he'd run out of ammunition Chris had screamed, run to the other machines, started tearing at them with his own human hands, and he'd been wreathed in rage and lethal sparks.

Sebastian-Stitch had done nothing: just watched him, just let him tear the place apart, because that had felt right: Chris was here so that he could destroy the machines.

Shadows across them both, and Sebastian-Stitch turning around, registering opponents surrounding him, and he'd left Chris to his work to launch into his own. The continuous thud of bodies hitting the floor. He'd mirrored Chris's assault on the machines with an assault on their enemies - reckless, grinning, rage lighting him up, clinical and precise - 

A muzzle pointed at Chris - 

And Sebastian-Stitch had dropped to the floor, scuttled forward, and torn that enemy's throat out.

"No one touches him," he'd announced.

"And no one touches him, either," Chris had said, immediately after.

Sebastian-Stitch had grinned to see their enemies start backing away.

Chris holding a handful of sparking wires in his bare hands as he stood next to a tank. Slow-bubbling liquid.

"Clear?" Chris'd asked.

Sebastian-Stitch had nodded. Had stepped to his side once again. 

"What does this do?" 

Sebastian-Stitch had smiled. "If you put the wires in the tank, this ship will explode."

Wide eyes. "I thought that only happened in the movies."

"You will have to show me those movies."

"Yeah, yeah, I will." And: "Thanks for taking me along."

"It is I who should be thanking you."

"Nope," Chris'd said. "Just doing what I can. I'm the sidekick, you're the hero, you're cute and you're fluffy and you're the hero of this story."

He'd laughed, and the weapon in his hand had remained steady. 

Environment suits. Something for their getaway. Neither suit really fits. They make do.

And Sebastian-Stitch watches, now, with great satisfaction, as the ship far overhead goes up in flames.

*

Falling and falling and - oh god, what's going to happen if they fall into the water -

Chris screams, exhilarated despite himself, despite the chilling fear, because how many people got to blow up a spaceship? 

He clutches at Sebastian-Stitch, and he knows he's not imagining that Sebastian-Stitch is clutching back just as urgently, and he knows without looking that somewhere below them is Hawaii: islands, mountains, water, trees.

He's falling, and he'd throw up from the sheer terror and the sheer adrenaline rush if only he could find a way to make sure what he spews up doesn't get trapped inside his suit or gets splattered all over Sebastian-Stitch's - and at the same time he's choking from the exhilaration, from the sure knowledge that he's alive and that he's home, that he's with Sebastian-Stitch, that Sebastian-Stitch is here with him - that strange heart beating so loudly beneath his ears - 

"Worth it," he says to himself, "worth it!" He screams into the sky.

And - "Yes" - unexpected answer - somehow Sebastian-Stitch can hear him, somehow Sebastian-Stitch agrees with him, and Chris's terror melts away in the face of that sheer radiant _truth_.

Debris streaks out of the sky, falling faster than they're falling, and Chris doesn't need to be told that falling will hurt, that it will soon be their turn for impact.

He knows he won't let go of Sebastian-Stitch, not now that they're here, not now and not ever.

*

Anthony looks like he might be about to - and here Sebastian-Stitch searches his memory for a colorful turn of phrase, something he's heard from Chris - ah, it's that one - blow a gasket.

Stabbing finger, pointing, trembling with incredulity. "You fell out of the sky. _I saw both of you falling out of the fucking sky._ How are you even still alive? What the actual flying fuck did you do?!"

Sebastian-Stitch keeps grinning as Anthony rounds on him, focuses. "And you! You complete and utter - you - " Sputtering, incoherence, and then the word "enabler" falls from Anthony's mouth and Sebastian-Stitch cuts a glance at a grinning Chris - a bright expression, clear eyes, despite the bandages, despite his left arm in a sling - and says, calm and straight-faced: 

"Also cute and fluffy."

Chris snorts, winces, starts laughing, until he's gasping in hilarity and pain both. 

The sounds bring nurses in, and Anthony is nearly ordered out, and Chris alternates between giggling and dismay at his laid-up state and the painkillers being injected into his system, and Sebastian-Stitch reaches out for Chris's hand and squeezes, carefully.

*

Chris wakes up to the middle of the night and an open window, to the sound of the waves and to the pressure of Sebastian-Stitch's hand, and he thinks about tomorrow.

He thinks about Sebastian-Stitch in a life-jacket, in a canoe, on a cruise ship, safely out on the water somehow.

He thinks about asking Sebastian-Stitch to teach him about the stars.

He thinks about cleaning up the little house and maybe expanding it. Enough space for him and for Sebastian-Stitch, enough space for him to learn how to make the malasadas Sebastian-Stitch loves, maybe even enough space so that they can offer shelter to turtles and their young, passing by on the way to the waves.

Maybe they'll be attacked again. Maybe not. So he thinks about how video games are not enough to train on, and he thinks about taking up some kind of martial art, some kind of gymnastics, some way to help him protect Sebastian-Stitch, who does not need his protection but he'll do it anyway. Whatever he can. Everything he can.

He leans over, winces at the pull in his side, presses a kiss to the top of Sebastian-Stitch's head.

In the morning maybe he'll be brave enough to kiss him, really kiss him, like they'd kissed on the enemy ship, just before falling.

*

(Chris wakes up to that kiss.)

**-fin-**


End file.
